records show that "people were necessitated to live upon clams and
muscles and ground nuts and acorns, and these got with much
difficulty in the winter-time. People were very much tried and
discouraged, especially when they heard that the Governor himself
had the last batch of bread in the oven."

All fared alike so far as possible, the richer and more provident
distributing to the poor, and all watching eagerly for the ship
sent back in July in anticipation of precisely such a crisis. Six
months had passed, when, on the fifth of February, 1631, Mather
records that as Winthrop stood at his door giving "the last
handful of meal in the barrel unto a poor man distressed by the
wolf at the door, at that instant, they spied a ship arrived at
the harbor's mouth with provisions for them all." The Fast day
just appointed became one of rejoicing, the first formal
proclamation for Thanksgiving Day being issued, "by order of the
Governour and Council, directed to all the plantations, and though
the stores held little reminder of holiday time in Old England,
grateful hearts did not stop to weigh differences. In any case the
worst was past and early spring brought the hope of substantial
comfort, for the town was 'laid out in squares, the streets
intersecting each other at right-angles,' and houses were built
as rapidly as their small force of carpenters could work.
Bradstreet's house was at the corner of 'Brayntree' and Wood
Streets, the spot now occupied by the familiar University Book-
store of Messrs. Sever and Francis on Harvard Square, his plot of
ground being 'aboute one rood,' and Dudley's on a lot of half an
acre was but a little distance from them at the corner of the
present Dunster and South Streets." Governor Winthrop's decision
not to remain here, brought about some sharp correspondence